Lately I have been reading Donald Miller’s blog. This is mostly because I read two of his books while away at school and I completely fell in love with his writing. Something about his simplicity and quirky writing style helped me to feel he was humble. Obviously I do not know him personally so I cannot really say for certain, but as I turned page after page I experienced a type of “coffee-date-comfort” as if we were just sitting around Tim Horton’s discussing God. The ease in his writing melted away my desire to “study” and rather encouraged me to just “soak up” his thoughts and opinions.
In January he wrote a post describing how to live a meaningful life. Lately, with working full time, living in Tsawwassen and floating around while most are away at University, life feels anything but meaningful. It has been diced with routine and things that used to give me such joy have been set to the wayside because of awkward work scheduling, especially, attending church.
It is interesting however, because this lifestyle has left me examining things in more fine detail. When one spends every day doing practically the same thing over and over it becomes much more memorable when something unusual occurs. I savour time with friends and family and anything else that occurs because it isn’t the “same old same old”. It has provoked a desire to savour everyday moments into making them memorable. I make an effort to engage because I have noticed that all to easily life can just cruise on by while I am on auto-pilot. As put by Margaret Bonnano, “It is only possible to live happily-ever-after on a day-to-day basis”. Taking three minutes to talk to co-workers, old friends or my little sister have become somewhat important to me. I want to dig deeper, cherish those people and make sure that they know, in that very moment and every moment to come, how much I love them and being around them. This means, sometimes working past tough issues, taking risks that would be easy not to take and making the extra effort to show you care.
I know I am about to leave again and set off to an adventure where things will always be exciting and changing so I hope I can carry these same desires with me still. I am so excited at the prospect of meeting new people and also of seeing old friends which I love so dearly and could not picture my life without. So, not letting yesterday take up too much of today, I am relishing in each moment to make it memorable and meaningful.
Since I have got home my life has been a whirlwind of catching up with old friends, applying for job after job and lots of driving! There is one thing however that has plagued me since the very moment I arrived in Canada; the cold. The first steps off the plane were met by a brisk wind that blanketed my sun saturated skin and filled my tropically accustomed lungs (Don't worry, I already hear the chorus of people saying "we don't feel sorry for you"). This new and all too easily forgotten feeling of winter was not such an easy thing to adjust to. In fact, I have now found myself stealing housecoats at Costco so that I can wear them around the freezing cold store, situating myself on the edge of the Olive Garden fireplace while I eat my dinner as to simply be comfortable and avoiding eating frozen food so I won’t have to venture to the freezer aisles of Safeway. While to others I may appear slightly insane or dramatic, to myself, I am simply trying to survive in this bitter cold.
We all came from vastly different worlds and now, after four months, we watch one another past through the gate of Portantorchas, some for the very last time, and drive down the hill that we often complained about having to climb, wondering if we may never see that person that we have come to love as a brother or sister again in this lifetime. Then, we make our way back into the Salla where we stumbled into every morning, eyes half-shut, PJ’s still on and warm from bed, hair messy and unwashed but hey, it didn’t matter because we were like siblings. I think it is going to be the strangest, perhaps most empty feeling to leave the safety of the Port bubble and wake up in a room that is all my own; not sitting down and eating breakfast with my friends every morning, not playing hours of ping-pong because I guess I will have “better things” to do, not speaking Spanish because no one will know what I am saying and not eating copious amounts of McDonalds. Yes, I will be the first to admit I have complained before about how I “miss home” and how excited I will be to go home with all its comforts. However, there may just be a small part of me that wakes up that first morning, in my own bed, uninterrupted by several alarm clocks and blow-dryers, not having to wait for the bathroom (or finding another one all together because someone neglected to pay heed to the angry sign on the door)... and I will think...man, I really miss that place.
Yes, we all came from immeasurably different worlds, and even though we know each other very well, we do not know what it going to be like for our fellow friends to dive back into the lives they used to call normal, whatever that may be. Therefore, to all of you, I promise you that I will always keep you in my prayers and I love you and will miss you all very much!
